A Career in the Trash


One task today in cleaning out the old shed was to throw out a 4-foot pile of documentation that I tucked away 4 years ago when I went to work on the final program of my career. In that pile were Military Standards, reliability and engineering design handbooks, computer programs I had written for statistical analyses and reliability test simulations and lots of documentation and historical data we used to track and measure reliability on the AMRAAM missile program.


It felt strange tossing out what used to be critical information for doing my job. Now, apart from nostalgia there is little value to the information and references. It was interesting reading the names of so many people I had worked with. I even found a farewell poem I wrote for Mark Waltrip, a Lieutenant in our office at the time, who was quite a character. He researched and decided the best vehicle for his needs. It was a Suzuki Samurai. He bought one. Two weeks later Consumer’s Reports came out with a scathing report on the vehicle because it had a tendency to roll-over easily. I did make a note of that in my poem. One thing I didn't throw out yet were about 10 green notebooks that I used to log my daily activities. I figured maybe I'd want to sift through them someday and remember all the tasks and deadlines that were so important at the time and refresh my fading memory with the names of people I worked with.


I have disrupted 5 semi-torpid geckos so far in my shed clean out. I’d open up a 3-ring binder and there one would be inside the rings – too cold and lethargic to move. This cold weather is not a good time to be a cold-blooded critter.

I’ve also uncovered a lot of roach do-do and many signs that rodents had inhabited parts of the shed. I found no live bugs or rodents.


I’ve been listening to a book on tape. I finished the 9th and what I thought was the last tape only to find out there was a tape #10 that was not in the box. (we think we bought the tapes used from the library) So I spent a lot of time on the book and don’t know how it ends. After that dissapointment I found and popped in one of the cassettes that sister Kathy had sent me when she lived in NJ. It was all about the big snowstorm they had. The flip side of the tape had a visit to her house by our Mom and Dad and a little of a visit to Sally’s house in CT. Kathy had everyone she could get to say “Hi” to me and Penny and Karen Marie. The tape was made in 1978 so Christy wasn’t in the picture yet. Given some time I’ll copy the tape to CD and give it to Kathy.


It is finally warming a little. We wont have a freeze tonight. Tomorrow is supposed to be quite pleasant. I will finish cleaning out the shed tomorrow and start filling it up again in a more orderly fashion. I’m anxious to see how much I will get in there.

I intentionally used the term “surge” in yesterday’s blog to see if Karen would pick up on it. The news of the day was that it was one of the most overused terms in the news and that we should stop using it. I’m proud to say Karen picked up on it and commented about it. Way to go Karen. You see, “surge” is the new “push”.